Importance Of Inquiry Based Learning Approach

An inquiry based learning approach is being adopted by educators across learning areas in the curriculum. One such learning area embracing an inquiry based approach is the teaching of history. An inquiry based learning approach liberates history teachings, allowing for students to break away from their role of knowledge reciting parrots, instead becoming investigators of history. An inquiry approach is a powerful tool for early childhood educators introducing young children to the history learning area. Early childhood teachers are able to create inquiry based projects for early learners in which they will be engaged in investigations about their families, prior and current events.

Woolfolk and Margetts (2013, p. 327) define inquiry learning

5) a child’s curiosity ‘plays the most effective provocation for learning’. It is an aim in the Western Australian curriculum for pre-primary for children to learn about their personal and family history (SCSA, 2014). Students should be aware that they are participants in their own history. The International Baccalaureate (2013, p. 4) suggest that learning by doing will enhance the child’s knowledge of self and others. Through inquiry a child will gain personal experience and will gain meaning. Acting as a historian in the exploration of their own history the child will gain the understanding that history develops over time through the exploration of others. This is the discipline of history. The Western Australian curriculum presents opportunities for students to explore the discipline of history through ‘continuity and change, cause and effect, perspectives, empathy and significance’ (SCSA, 2014). All of these opportunities will be presented to the class through the inquiry process. According to Woolfolk and Margetts (2013, p. 329) students will complete curriculum content and learn the process simultaneously. Inquiry is integrated into the history curriculum (SCSA, 2014). History will be taught to young children in Western Australia through a framework focussing around key inquiry questions. For pre-primary the key inquiry questions are to find out the child’s history and establish how they know this, to

One raised in “Capacity Building Series K-12: Inquiry Based Learning” (2013, p. 3) is that teachers are unsure how to address curriculum expectations in an inquiry based project. This is due to the spontaneous nature of inquiry. Allowing students to co-author the inquiry process means the end result cannot be predicted. However, it is believed that by focusing on how students follow the main processes of the inquiry the overarching curriculum goals will be achieved (“Capacity Building Series K-12: Inquiry Based Learning”, 2013, p. 3). The focus of the inquiry should be on how students are developing skills and developing understanding of the learning area rather than content recital. Content recital does not require the application of critical thinking skills. Anderson Steeves (2005, p.71) believes that content and skill development should come together within a ‘thinking curriculum’. This is achieved with an inquiry approach. Inquiry can be limited by educator beliefs that student’s will be hindered during exams and not meet educational standards if they do not cover content and instead engage in inquiry (Voet & De Wever, 2015, p. 59). These educators should consider the concept of the thinking curriculum. Another criticism is that inquiry projects take a lot of classroom time to complete, are limited by available resources and that students are simply incapable